Monster Truck Will Shake New Zealand for Safer Buildings

T-REX, a shaker truck that produces seismic waves, will help engineers test soils in Christchurch, New Zealand, for liquefaction.

Credit: Network of Earthquake Engineering Simulation

With the tires of a monster truck and guts that pound the ground like a dinosaur, the T-Rex is not just the ultimate Tonka toy.

The truck simulates an earthquake, revealing the properties of rocks and sediments below to watching researchers, and therefore shedding light on how the ground shakes during a temblor.

The U.S. Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation is sending T-Rex to New Zealand's South Island, to shake the soils around Christchurch, where a series of earthquakes in 2011 destroyed buildings and took lives.

The earthquakes caused widespread liquefaction, a phenomenon in which shaking of water-logged soils turns the sediment temporarily from a solid to a liquid. The jiggly, wet soils undermined buildings and other structures. As many as 7,500 homes were abandoned. Parts of downtown Christchurch remain cordoned off due to the extensive damage.

An aerial view of Christchurch, New Zealand, where a magnitude 6.3 earthquake struck Feb. 22.

Credit: NASA Earth Observatory

The seismic data gathered with T-Rex will inform engineers, on an area-by-area basis, how to rebuild structures in Christchurch to resist future earthquakes, according to a statement from the Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation. The seismic waves can find which soils are more likely to liquefy, and which soils are more stable. Engineers can design structures to withstand earthquakes, but first they need to know more about the soils in each area, the statement said.

"Designing a quake-resistant building starts with the soil," Brady Cox, a professor at the University of Texas at Austin, said in the statement. "The stiffness and layering of the soil has a profound effect on the strength of shaking felt during an earthquake."

Becky Oskin covers Earth science, climate change and space, as well as general science topics. Becky was a science reporter at Live Science and The Pasadena Star-News; she has freelanced for New Scientist and the American Institute of Physics. She earned a master's degree in geology from Caltech, a bachelor's degree from Washington State University, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz.